This was a vase I made back in 2013 when I went on a bit of a concrete DIY binge. Ha! Have you ever worked with concrete? It’s so much fun. Messy and fun. This is my Concrete Honey Bear Vase DIY and I’ve added just a couple of changes that you can find below (suggestions from a couple of awesome readers)… Any of my changes are in BOLD and Italic font! Enjoy.

Supplies:

One 3/4 inch wide and change: cut to a height that’s taller than the top of the bear’s head

Water

Change: use a PVC pipe cap instead of tape

Shovel/stick to mix the concrete.

Large container to mix concrete (we used two 5 gallon buckets)

Pliers, wire cutters, and blade to peel off plastic

Olive oil

Directions:

Step 1:

Prep your honey bear bottle. Clean it. Cut the top off the bottle. I did this so I could fit the PVC pipe into the bear.

Step 2:

Cut the PVC pipe to size (you can get this done at the hardware store if you don’t have a pipe cutter.

Change: Originally I sealed the PVC pipe with tape, but it makes sense to seal the pipe with a PVC cap. They are inexpensive. Another change: add a very small amount of olive oil to the bottle. This will help lubricate the inside of the bottle so it’s easier to remove the plastic later.

Step 3:

It’s time to pour your concrete! Safety note: wear gloves/eye protection/dust filter mask for this process. Change: For some reason I did not realize that you could buy a small bag of concrete… you totally can. Check this out. Anyway: Mix your concrete together with water. I’m not positive how much water I used, but slowly add water until the mixture is slushy. Add more concrete if it gets too watery. If you’ve never mixed concrete before I recommend watching this video by Quikrete.

Pour the prepped concrete into the bear.

Step 4:

Push the PVC pipe (with the capped portion of the pipe face down) into the concrete bear. You’ll have a bit of concrete pour out. Tap the base of the bear on the ground to get air bubble out. If the pipe starts to float to the top, tape it down. Clean up the top of the bear (it’s a bit messy).

Step 5:

30 to 45 minutes after the pour, smooth out the top of the bear’s head.

Step 6:

Let Honey Bear dry for 2 + days. I took this bear out after 24 hours, and he still had a few lose pieces on the back. Needed more time. Still looks cute!

Step 7:

Onto the pain in the buns portion of this DIY: Take the plastic off your concrete honey bear.

Change: this part of the DIY should be easier if you had oiled the bear bottle.

I admit this killed me. Lots of swearing, etc. BUT, I did it. Using pliers, a wire cutter, and a blade. Tips: Use the blade to cut some lines on the back. Use the wire cutters to snip little pieces to get a portion of the plastic to start peeling. Use the pliers to twist off (I’m talking actually twisting the pliers) to pull off the plastic. I worked on creating one big line on the back. I was able to pull it off… after a bit of work.

You’re done! It’s now a cute kitschy pencil holder…. or bud vase? I think I’ll be putting a little succulent in it and putting him outside. Yes, that’s cute.

ALSO, new blog post on Better Homes and Gardens. Can you guess what it’s about? Yeah. Concrete. You gotta check out my Outdoor Concrete Stool/Table.

We are getting close to Easter so that means I’m starting to plan our Easter egg crafts! We typically do something crazy and fun. Today I’m sharing 10 Fun Easter Egg DIY’s I’ve found around the web this weekend (including 3 of my favorite egg crafts I’ve made in the past).

Learning How To Tie a Bowline Knot is one of the most handy tricks I’ve picked up along this DIY journey. I craft a lot of everything (that’s pretty obvious) and I’m often tying knots for these projects. It’s important to know how to properly tie a knot and there are many knots with hundreds of uses. The bowline knot (pronounced “boh-lin”) is one of the most versatile and easy to tie. Even though there are quite of few different bowline knots out there this version I’m sharing is popular because of it’s strength and it’s simple to tie.

Are you ready to learn how to tie a bowline knot?

Step 1:

Make a small loop in the rope. Leaving a long enough “tail” at the end to tie the bowline knot. Pass the tail of the rope under and through the loop. Bring the tail around the “back” of the top portion of the rope.

Step 2:

Bring the tail around to the “front” and then pass the tail back through the small loop.

Step 3:

Tighten the knot by pulling the tail down and the top of the rope up.

Step 4:

Your knot is ready! If you need to undo the knot simply loosen the loop on the knot.

This may be one of my more nerdy posts, but I love a good knot. I mean: why knot share this DIY? See what I did there? It’s so fascinating that a properly tied knot can be so strong! I just finished a project and used this knot (it will be up on the blog soon).

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Hey friends! It’s International Women’s Day and to celebrate all my ladies and friends I have 15% off of EVERYTHING in my shop. Yes. Everything. The sale goes through the rest of today and is over by the end of the day tomorrow (Friday the 9th). No need for a code. All of the items are automatically on sale.

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I’ve been to a ton of conferences, but Alt Summit is my favorite of all them. It’s full of creative and talented people and it was in beautiful Palm Springs. There’s a lot to learn and a ton of fun to be had. If you’ve never been check out what I loved about my trip to Alt Summit 2018 below!

The People

I think this is probably the best part of the whole show. I’ve met some amazing people that are now forever friends.

Inspiration

I work from home. Alone. I mostly just talk to myself about business and do my own research. When I’m at Alt I get to chat with other business owners and bloggers to grow and learn. Talking with other creatives is inspiring and I always come home feeling refreshed and ready to apply this new business knowledge to my own work.

New in the shop! This Protect Kids, Not Guns is a digital download that comes in multiple sizes at a low price. There are even sizes that will work perfect if you plan on attending the March for Our Lives march, on March 24th.

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